The cost of your leads of Meta’s platforms can vary. When do you know to change things up, and what do you change? In this article I’ll walk you through it.
Check the metrics
In the upper right hand corner, you can change the date range to view your numbers. Generally the best number to view is “Last 30 days” as it will give you more data. Last 14 and Last 7 days will give you a trend.
If your ads are relatively new, you need at least a month’s worth of data to know what the cost per lead is for your market. Industry standard is $15-25/lead and the size of your audience, age, activity level, competition with other advertisers, and market fatigue are all factors that can impact your ad cost.
What to look for?
- CPC (Cost per link click) – Expect this to be under $3, and ideally under $2.
- Cost Per Result – Usually 10-15x the CPC
- CTR (Link click-through rate) – Usually between 0.50% – 1.0%, anything above 1% = happy days
- Frequency – Ideally below 3.
Look at the trend
If your costs are creeping up slowly, this is down to the market, and periodly refreshing your creative is the way to go here.
If your CPC is starting to rise, it’s a good idea to change your creative. If your frequency is above 3, people are seeing your ad a little too much, and you will need to either a) broaden your audience, b) lower your budget, or c) update the images, headline and text a little more frequently than if your frequency number is low.
If your CPC is in line with above, but your Cost Per Result is steadily higher than 10-15x the CPC, look into adjusting your forms.
Time to Panic?
If your lead cost suddenly shoots up, it’s due to the algorithm changing on you. You’ll know this if the CPC is low, and the Cost per result is way higher than 10-15x.
I know it’s hard, but patience can be your friend here. A lot of times these issues last only 7-14 days, and while it’s painful to be spending money short term with no results, the algorithm can often correct itself without any intervention.
If costs aren’t coming down, or you want to fix this sooner, make updates at the AD SET level.
- Start by changing the placements (which versions of Facebook and Instagram it’s shown on). For image based ads, remove any video or reel options, along with search results and apps.
- The next step would be to change to Advantage Audience. At the time of writing (May 2025) you will need to experiment with turning this feature on or off and monitoring results. This is best done by duplicating your ad set and implementing the changes.
- The third step would be to stop and restart your campaign from scratch. I’m aware it’s the classic turn it off and turn it on again strategy but you’ll need to reset the machine learning on your campaign.
If you’re unsure what to do, or want a dedicated professional to take care of this for you, just reach out and I’ll be happy to help!